Chemical Education

Supporting Chemistry Learning at Schools

In pursuit of chemical education quality improvement and its popularization, Dmitry Firtash’s Group DF has been providing support to most gifted students and teachers featuring outstanding results in chemistry learning and teaching.

The Group provides sponsorship support to 10 and 11-graders winning prizes at Ukrainian and international chemistry Olympiads. In addition to presenting valuable awards and prizes to them, Group DF finances extra-curriculum learning programs and courses for the young hopefuls.

Mr. Firtash’s group of companies has instituted an annual personal teacher’s grant for teachers training Ukrainian chemistry Olympiads prize-winners. This grant is awarded to eligible grantees with the support of “Nadra” bank.

As part of the school chemical education support program, since 2011 Group DF has been financing the final rounds of the Ukrainian Olympiad for 10 and 11-grades.

Group DF has been attaching great importance to equipping chemical labs of Ukrainian schools with material and technical resources. According to a survey of the Cabinet of Ministers of Ukraine, the technical and materials assets available at Ukrainian schools could only meet 30% of the existing requirement while the needs of chemistry, physics and biology studies were covered to an extent of as low as just 10-15 %. This situation brings about two major problems. First, the high level of theoretical training appears offset with gaps in their practical skills. Second of all, the students’ interest in sciences is compromised as running experiments empirically is clearly a more compelling and exciting exercise than just taking notes.

The Group of chemical enterprises OSTCHEM being part of Group DF donated chemical lab equipment and reagents to 26 Ukrainian schools having prepared the 2011 Ukrainian Olympiad winners.

Also the Chairman of the Group DF Supervisory Council Dmitry Firtash investing in the chemical industry of Ukraine provides substantial support to chemical education in the international arena. In particular, OSTCHEM is a general sponsor of students’ national teams representing Ukraine at International Chemistry Olympiads in 2011-2014.

Seeking to raise the practical dimension of Ukrainian team’s preparedness to the international Olympiad, a laboratory base at Kharkov National V. Karazin University has been re-equipped and upgraded at the expense of OSTCHEM being part of Group DF.

Group DF also supports the organization of training session helping International Olympiad participants successfully prepare to the high-level international competitions.

The chemical education support project is implemented in close cooperation with the Ministry of Education, Science, Youth and Sports of Ukraine as part of the National Social Program of Sciences Education Quality Improvement for the period until 2015 approved by the Cabinet of Ministers of Ukraine on 13 April 2011.